Georgia Ethics Panel Files Complaints Against 13 State Lawmaker The

Georgia ethics panel files complaints against 13 state lawmaker The Georgia ethics commission on Thursday announced it had filed complaints against 13 state lawmakers, saying each broke campaign finance laws including, in some cases, not disclosing contributions they received. David Emadi, the commission’s executive secretary, said when he took over earlier this year that he was told lawmakers weren’t following campaign finance laws. He said a preliminary audit confirmed that the state representatives and senators may have broken campaign finance laws. Those who received complaints were Sen. David Lucas, D-Macon; Sen. Sheikh Rahman, D-Lawrenceville; Sen. Horacena Tate, D-Atlanta; Rep. James Burchett, R-Waycross; Rep. Winfred Dukes, D-Albany; Rep. Pat Gardner, D-Atlanta; Rep. Vernon Jones, D-Lithonia; Rep. Colton Moore, R-Trenton; Rep. Brenda Lopez Romero, D-Norcross; Rep. Steven Sainz, R-Woodbine; Rep. Dexter Sharper, D-Valdosta; and Rep. Mickey Stephens, D-Savannah. A complaint was prepared for an ex-lawmaker, but the name was not released because he had not yet been served with it, as of Thursday. Sources told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution it was former Rep. David Stover, R-Newnan, who resigned earlier this year. Many of the accusations involve lawmakers who either were late filing campaign reports or didn’t file them at all, issues that, in the past, didn’t always lead to a formal complaint being filed. Some, such as Gardner, acknowledged errors in their reports, while others, including Lucas, recently filed new reports. Others involve lawmakers who filed reports that said they received and spent no money, took contributions during the legislative session — which is illegal — or took contributions in excess of the legal limits. Many lawmakers receive the bulk of their contributions from special-interest political action committees and business associations with interest in legislation, so ethics staffers were able to find contributions that had been given to lawmakers, even though they reported receiving nothing. PACs and other groups file regular reports disclosing what they contribute. Emadi told the commission Thursday, “It is an incredible violation of public trust if the violations did occur.” On Aug. 30, Sharper sent a handwritten response to the commission, saying he has not held a fundraiser or had expenses during the time periods in question. “As a Democrat in Georgia, lobbyists don’t really contribute much to me,” Sharper said. “Also, I am not on committees that are very active so there are less contributions.” In a letter dated Sept. 18, Moore told the commission he did not raise or spend any money during the reporting period that ended June 30. However, he said his Jan. 31 filing was inaccurate and that he has since submitted an amended report. Sainz, who is serving his first term, told the commission he accidentally checked a box that said he had no contributions or expenditures to report and had trouble figuring out how to fix his mistake online. Jones wrote the commission that his campaign made an error “interpreting the date this report was due.” Once it was brought to his attention, Jones said, he filed the report and paid a late fee. “My campaign accepts full responsibility and accountability of our report not being filed accordingly,” Jones wrote. “We thank you and commend your office for their hard work and various audits and controls you have in place.” The commission’s staff in 2017 said it would begin auditing the reports filed by candidates in the Atlanta mayor’s race that year and statewide candidates in the 2018 elections. Emadi said earlier this year that he was looking into violations by the campaign of Democratic gubernatorial nominee Stacey Abrams and Atlanta mayoral candidates. Cases against two minor Atlanta mayoral candidates moved forward Thursday, and others are expected later this year or in 2020. Emadi took heat when he filed a spate of subpoenas targeting groups led by Abrams and the chairwoman of the state Democratic Party, prompting criticism that he’s trying to exact political revenge against Republican Gov. Brian Kemp’s political opponents. The AJC reported when he was appointed in March that Emadi was a former officer in the Douglas County Republican Party who once worked briefly for GOP House Speaker David Ralston. He also donated $600 last year to Kemp’s campaign for governor. The subpoenas obtained by the AJC were filed April 26 and sought extensive financial, bank and payroll records from the Abrams’ campaign, which raised roughly $30 million in last year’s race against Kemp. The ethics office also wanted all correspondence between the Abrams campaign and a constellation of left-leaning groups that registered and mobilized voters, many with a focus on energizing minorities. They included the voting rights group Abrams helped launch and a nonprofit co-founded by state Sen. Nikema Williams, the leader of the state Democratic Party. In the documents, Emadi revealed that investigators intend to present evidence the Abrams campaign accepted donations from four of the groups that exceeded maximum contribution limits for a statewide campaign. Abrams’ attorney has vigorously denied that claim, saying investigators have failed to prove any wrongdoing and offered full cooperation to clear up any technical violations. She also questioned why investigators only demanded records from groups “led by black or Latino Georgians working to increase election participation among voters of color.” Assemblyman introduced bill pushed by firm that paid him ALBANY — On May 27, 2015, Bronx Assemblyman Michael Blake introduced a bill pushed by Airbnb, the multi-billion-dollar short-term rental platform. The measure had been a top Airbnb legislative priority in Albany that year. While little noticed at the time, public records released in the months and years that followed raise questions about a potentially major conflict of interest between Blake's legislative act – introducing a bill — and a source of his private income. In the month prior to the introduction of Blake's bill, Airbnb paid $189,000 to a prominent political consulting firm, Hilltop Public Solutions, to assist in its lobbying in New York. Hilltop's efforts included helping organize grassroots support for the legislation that Blake introduced. Publicly unknown at the time was that Blake, a political consultant with prominence in national Democratic politics, was being paid by Hilltop as a political consultant. In other words: In 2015, Blake was being paid by Hilltop; Airbnb was paying Hilltop; and Blake introduced legislation Airbnb had been pushing. Blake's financial disclosure form for 2015 reveals that Hilltop — formally identified by its corporate name, S&B Public Solutions — paid Blake between $5,000 and $20,000 to work for "out of state" clients. But Blake insists he never worked for Airbnb. "It has the appearance of a conflict of interest," said Susan Lerner, executive director of Common Cause New York, a leading good government group. "The basis on which all of this took place, we don't know. But no legislator should be in this situation." The Hilltop official that Airbnb retained in New York was Bill Hyers, then a partner in the firm's New York City office. Hyers had gained prominence as an architect of Bill de Blasio's election as New York City mayor in 2013. Hyers is also a good friend of Blake, and was an early and generous financial supporter of his campaigns. More recently, he served as a well-paid Blake campaign consultant. In response to questions from the Times Union, Hyers refused to say whether he'd ever discussed matters related to Airbnb with Blake — including the bill the Assemblyman introduced in 2015, and which Hilltop helped push in the weeks prior. "This is a stupid rabbit hole (I'm) not going down for the umpteenth time," Hyers said in an email. Krysten Copeland, a spokeswoman for Blake's current congressional campaign, said in a statement that he "never worked with Airbnb during his time with Hilltop, rather he worked on political campaigns in Maryland and Iowa" in 2015. "Further, Mr. Blake has never worked as a lobbyist during his time with Hilltop or any other organization. Any bills that Mr. Blake introduces are of his own volition and for the betterment of the people of the state of New York." Blake insisted he never discussed Airbnb with Hyers before the bill's introduction. An Airbnb spokesman, Christopher Nulty, said that Bolton-St. Johns, a top lobbying firm also working for the company, had been responsible for pushing for introduction of the legislation that Blake introduced. "Michael Blake has never done any work on behalf of Airbnb," Nulty said. According to the company, Airbnb didn't know in 2015 that Blake was doing consulting work for Hilltop, and only found out from later media reports. The company maintains it is unaware of any 2015 conversations between Hyers and Blake about the legislation. Hilltop, based in Washington D.C., is one of the breed of "strategic communications" firms that work on lawmakers' campaigns and develop close relationships with them, but whose employees rarely register as having done lobbying. Bolton-St. Johns' public filings listed only one specific bill of interest during the the 2015 legislative session: the one introduced by Blake. The bill would have allowed Airbnb to collect "occupancy tax" from Airbnb renters – thus lifting the collection burden off its "hosts" – before passing the money on to state government. Given that Blake was a freshman member of the Assembly with relatively meager legislative influence, he was a somewhat unusual pick to carry the significant legislation for Airbnb. Airbnb declined to explain why Blake was chosen to carry the legislation, as did a Bolton-St. Johns representative.

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